I saw a picture the other day; it was a woman, with three kids ages 3 years, 2 years, and 8 months. The mother looked like she just walked out of a sporty Victoria’s Secret commercial. The caption for the picture was, “What’s your excuse?” At first I was offended. I was definitely fit before I had my first child, but I gained 40 pounds during my pregnancy despite continuous exercise, eating the same amount of calories, “giving in” to my cravings for vegetables, and my doctor telling me I was "gaining too much weight". As someone who has always struggled with a healthy body image (read "fear of being fat"), being pregnant and gaining weight was hard. I wanted to be one of those "skinny pregnant" women. Hearing my doctor say I was gaining too much weight made me cry. I vowed I would be "skinny" again.

After my pregnancy I managed to lose thirty pounds, but still ten pounds heavier than my previous weight, I was unhappy with myself. Even though I wasn't overweight, I thought to myself, “Self, you need to get skinny. You can’t be the “fat” mom. You only have one kid. You should be able to lose this weight.” I never did lose those ten pounds, despite continued exercise; biking, walking, pilates, yoga, Jillian Michaels, etc. When I saw this picture with an “apology” to the moms she had offended (me being one of them) I wanted to throw my phone across the room like a two year old. Then I realized, “How sad.” How sad that motherhood has been reduced to your dress size, ab count, and “what’s your excuse?” How sad to act as if motherhood is a beauty pageant and if you’re still hanging onto those extra ten pounds then shame on you.

How sad that we think that we aren't worth as much as the next mom because of our appearance. Motherhood is more than being the hot, skinny mom. Motherhood is more than how busy you are, how many extracurricular activities your child participates in, or how long you nurse your kid. Motherhood is about nurturing. Motherhood is about teaching your child skills; how to behave in public, to say “please” and “thank you”, to discipline, to teach independence and self-reliance. Motherhood is about love; learning to love and teaching your children to love. Motherhood is about charity. Motherhood is about who we are as women, whether we have children or not. We can all be mothers, love each other, and lift one another up. So instead of asking you, “What’s your excuse?” I’m going to ask you first, “What do you want to change?” and secondly, “How much have you changed since yesterday?” This is for all aspects of our lives; health, church, school, children, friends, etc. It’s okay to have that extra weight. It doesn’t make you a bad mother. Every day is a new day, a day to feel better, be better, and do better. Now I'm going to tell you and if you can relate to this post I hope you feel it: You are beautiful. You are wonderful. You are doing enough. Motherhood is more than our appearance. Motherhood is about our hearts and our actions. It starts, and ends, with love.

When my sister died, I changed my profile picture on Facebook to a little badge I made with her motto, "I choose to be happy". That same day, a handful of our Facebook friends changed their profile pictures to the same badge/picture. It got me thinking to myself, "Self, I can inspire good simply through a profile picture". Then I decided I was going to do just that. All the time.

Because I'm tired. I'm tired of being viewed as naive because I believe in God. I'm tired of being openly mocked because of my beliefs. I'm tired of people glorifying immorality and sneering at those who don't. I'm tired of a lot of things, but mostly, tired because I feel like I gave up trying to spread truth simply because I was afraid of offending people.

At the beginning of each month we will post a badge that you can use for your profile picture--you are more than welcome to use the picture for personal use on social media. Either save it and upload it to Facebook, or tag yourself in the photo and under "options" make it your profile picture

Tag us and mormon.org in your new profile pic! We want to see that you've used our picture!

Hello Nestie friends! Have you signed up for our blog updates? If you haven't, do it! (look in the sidebar) so you don't miss out on free stuff like this every week. These journal cards and handouts are for "How do I guard my virtue?" if you haven't covered that section yet. As always, click and save the images to print out on your own, or click here to download.

{journal cards 4x6}

{handouts 3x4/4x3}

Let us know if you download these! Feel free to pin and share with your friends!

I got to help my Auntie out last week with some cards for her ward's Relief Society night. If you think you can use them too click the images and save as or you can download them here! All images are 6x4. Enjoy!

This month's doctrinal principle in Come Follow Me is "Commandments". Alisha did a handout here for her class.

Sometimes I don't think we talk about the 10 Commandments enough. I thought that about my own family so I designed and had a printed fabric wall hanging about the 10 Commandments made. It says the commandment then what my interpretation is for following that commandment. I redesigned it here for you, our Nesties. It's an 8.5" x 11" downloadable for printing. Maybe you can use it this month.

All you have to do is say is whether you downloaded it or not. That's not a commandment, just a simple request.

Alisha did a graphic design "Kind Words" here and put it to a t-shirt. It made me think that I wanted to have Leila's words, "I Choose to be Happy" and Alisha's design on a t-shirt so I could order it. Alisha did it for me. (Thanks Alisha) When I went to look at it I saw these other things.

But then I saw this pillow and decided that I wanted this instead.

Click on the photo to take you to the pillows.

Not that you have to buy anything. I just thought I'd share because it made me happy.

Speaking without thinking is one of my greatest weaknesses. Even at 25 years old my mother is still telling me to "be nice!" Seriously. And even when I am being nice, a lot of times it sounds like I'm being insincere.

Have you heard about Project Life? It's basically just a cute way to do some memory keeping. I'm REALLY bad with writing a journal, but I think these project life journal cards I've seen floating around Pinterest are totally adorable. So I've made some 4x6 journal cards for you to download!

Just jot down a quick line or two, and keep them in a 4x6 photo protector! You can insert pictures as well. It's a quick, easy way to keep the memories alive! Right click on the photos and save as, or click here to download a printable PDF.

These are free for personal use or for use in your classes at church. Please do not redistribute for personal gain/commercial use.

Baby Joseph's Dad, Sky, called me today to share something Leila wrote. He found it on her iPad and it touched him. It was her mother wishes she wanted for Joseph. I don't know if she was finished with her list but it was enough.

The reality is that Joseph will never know Leila in this life and will have another mother to raise him. He'll be caught up in life and won't have a need to know her. But I suspect many years from now, likely when he's an adult, he'll wonder. He might be drawn to a few of the mementos that connect directly to her. They might give a glimpse of who she was and how she thought. Maybe he'll see a little of himself in her.

So today I spent some of my time putting her words into design for him.